Dictionary definitions of style
Styles of writing are different ways of using our common language by which we identify one writer, or one kind of writing, from another. It would be useful to look at some dictionary definitions to start with, which you can then refer back to if you want to remind yourself of some of the uses of the word style.
The following extracts from the New Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (1991) contain those definitions of style which you are likely to find relevant in studying written and spoken language. Some of the quotations which illustrate the different meanings have been printed also. Obsolete meanings are not included. The numbers before each paragraph indicate the different sections of the entry on style in the OED. The original meaning of the word, with its earliest recorded occurrence, was:
1. Stylus, pin, stalk. (An instrument made of metal, bone, etc., having one end sharp-pointed for incising letters on a wax tablet, and the other flat and broad for smoothing the tablet and erasing what is written: = stylus)
‘1387 John of Trevisa Seinte Barnabe his body was founde in a den...with pe gospel of Mathew pat he hadde i-wtite wip his owne stile.’
Activity 1. Read the extracts through and consider their differences. Notice how the original meaning of the word Style has developed and changed.
2. Writing; manner of writing (hence also of speaking).
3. The manner of expression characteristic of a particular writer (hence of an orator), or of a literary group or period; a writer's mode of expression considered in regard to clearness, effectiveness, beauty, and the like.
4. Used for: A good, choice or fine style.
5. Proverbial phrase, the style is the man.
(1624) R. Burton: It is most true, stylus vinim arguit, out stile bewrayes vs.
In generalized sense: Those features of literary composition which belong to form and expression rather than to the substance of the thought or matter expressed. Often used for: Good or fine style.
(1713) Steele: The Rules of Method, and the Propriety of Thought and Stile.
(1749) Chesterfield: Style is the dress of thoughts.
A manner of discourse, or tone of speaking, adopted in addressing others or in ordinary conversation.
(1667-8) Pepys Diary, 23 Feb.: But here talking, he did discourse in this stile: 'We', and 'We' all along, 'will not give any money’.
6. Manner, fashion.
In generalized sense. Often used for: Beauty or loftiness of style.
Notice that some of these definitions make a distinction between the form or manner or mode of expression and the content, message, or substance of thought. The idea that 'style is the dress of thoughts' has been disputed, on the grounds that thought and expression are inseparable.
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